Fellowship News

The Continuity of Elders' Wisdom

by Earl Loftfield

A HIGH LEVEL OF EXCITEMENT and activity permeated the four-day spring FIC board meeting, held at the Ganas community's new "Grow II" conference and retreat center in New York's Catskills. The main issue was the project, now in process, to restructure the FIC board. This generated deep and vigorous discussions on organizational elders, vision holders and values keepers, "letting go," incorporating newcomers, and passing on the visions, values, and "culture" of the organization.

From my perspective as someone relatively new to the FIC, I believe the organization has much to be proud of. I see a handful of people who, since 1986, have revitalized the organization with commitment, vision, and passion. This small group also carried out the bulk of the work--creating the Communities Directory, reviving Communities  magazine, and producing the Celebration of Community gathering. And they did it while living geographically separate, getting together twice a year at board meetings for intensive planning and organizing. The FIC now exists as a forum for service that has attracted a whole new group of talented, dedicated people.

The board meetings, which are open to the public (and heartily welcome guest participants), also serve as regional networking gatherings. They also offer public demonstrations of the consensus decision-making process in action. To make these low-cost events easier to attend, the meeting sites are rotated among different regions of North America.

Approximately 113 participants, mostly from the New York area and New England states, attended the regional networking gathering of this spring board meeting. After an initial session to determine people's primary interests, participants met in a series of concurrent groups focused on various topics. One group that drew a great deal of interest and passion was called the "Continuity of Elders' Wisdom." Participants were invited to share their thoughts on: 1) The nature of the topic as they understood it and where these thoughts led them; 2) What to do with the information/discussion generated--how to continue the exploration so that a transformative result could occur and benefit others who face such issues; 3) Personal experiences of having been meaningfully mentored, examining carefully the details of how and when they recognized the mentoring process was taking place.

Following are some of this networking group's insights and observations. These are presented without any attempt to affirm or deny them, and they do not represent any consensually agreed upon policies, values, or belief statements of the FIC.

• The issue of leadership, power, authority, and transmitting values is a classic conundrum, pervasive worldwide and arising in all group endeavors.
• The concept of "elders" involves recognition of that status. It is as dysfunctional for elders to not recognize themselves as such as it is for others to not recognize them as elders.
• What are the differences between an elder and non-elder? In what ways do the statements and actions of elders and non-elders have different impacts?
• "Values keeping" is not an inevitable function of people with group longevity.
• Elders could be defined as people who carry the community's vision or key issues in alignment with its values. Much of the conflict articulated in organizations is inaccurately aimed at the elders, rather than at the values in conflict.
• The concept of elders or "equals amongst equals" conflicts with the natural bias in many communities towards equality and egalitarianism. This results in the communities movement being inherently weak in mentoring.
• Start-up energy is significantly different from maintenance energy.
• Often senior organizational members, in communities or businesses, complain of being overloaded, yet they are unable to find any "qualified" people to help share the load. For the senior member, this can be experienced as stepping into a vacuum for which no one else will accept the responsibility.
• Founding energy can be seen as a separate and distinct quality from the energy of a values keeper. This can be seen in several examples: 1) A new member can be in harmony with and "devoted" to the original vision, even if that vision was not clearly articulated. 2) A founder can generate wild and impulsive visioning yet be unable to work with group dynamics. In most cases this distinction is not made clear.
• Many organizations want to export what they've learned to the rest of society, but are reticent to import lessons from the rest of society, as they're concerned they might lose or "dilute" their own culture. This is particularly applicable to the communities movement.
• Many of the "growing pains" experienced in organizations have an uncanny timing of occurring in the "teen" years of that organization. This is a time when children are naturally trying to experience their own identity independently of parents. It has been said that the job of a teen is to psychically kill the parent for the purpose of establishing his or her own identity. The job of the parents is to not kill the child as a response to the attacks they are feeling. The promise of healthy, whole, mature relationships is fulfilled only when both parties grow and transform tremendously in the process.
• The issue of founders "letting go" has some parallels to parents letting go. What is needed in both cases is love, support, encouragement, respect, and the freedom to make mistakes.
• Some models of creation define success as being able to completely release the creation. It is recognized that: 1) This is very hard to do, with few role models that have done this; 2) Unlike a business, which may be created and released, a community is intended to be a lifetime experience. In such a setting, a maxim could be, "Don't let go--adapt."
• One model of long-term health of a corporate entity begins with customer satisfaction, which comes from the continuity and longevity of employees, which comes from the quality and style of interaction within the organization. Communities also desire long-term health. What can we learn from this model?
• During the creative phase of an organization, it is likely that values are learned and shared out of the crucible of the initial creative fury. Often the common work is so consuming that no one stops to reflect on the values and culture being developed. Certainly when there's work to be done, people can't stop to get consensus about why they're doing it! One person may be entirely focused on service to humanity and the work as a spiritual practice; the next person may have no capacity to conceive of these concepts or may even be in total reaction to such ideas. In such situations people come to the work for their own individual reasons. The resultant culture exists as a feeling, and is sometimes a balance between powerful personalities. To someone who has not been in that crucible, it is not clear just how things work or flow. However, a time comes when that crucible is no longer available for imparting the group's values--the initial hard work has already been done, and people can't stay in that initial creative ferment forever. Without such a powerful instructing medium, what can be done to clearly and effectively communicate the group's vision? Lengthy discussion of the details of the organization doesn't really work as a solution to the passing on of the culture.
• Conversely, what actions can new members take that would allow the elders to safely release their values-keeper roles to others?
• In conjunction with the two above observations, failure to convey the "values" creates an environment in which succeeding "generations" can fall increasingly further from the original vision, without anyone's intending this to happen. Successive generations will add some values and drop some. As a result, the holders of the group's vision are likely to hold onto forms of control. Negative feelings and experiences can easily escalate in such situations.
• It is inherently challenging to maintain a new culture without the conscious awareness and intent to do so. The most commonly used models for perpetuating culture include the oral tradition, written tradition, and ritual traditions. Can consciousness be brought into a choice about how to carry on a group's culture?
• One understanding of the concept of leadership is that it consists of three distinct aspects: 1) The capacity to articulate the vision clearly and inspire others to support it enthusiastically; 2) Management and administrative skills; 3) The capacity for authority; that is, the ability to command respect, "personal power," or what is often called "charisma." These three aspects of leadership may not all exist in the same person. Many people see the first two aspects as learnable and the third as inherent--people are born with it.
• The concept of leadership is often perceived as in conflict with the concept of egalitarianism. This conflict interferes with leadership skills and value assignment.
• In practice, an egalitarian organization is not necessarily the same thing as an organization practicing consensus decision making. And vice versa.
• Consensus decision making is designed to be for the highest good of the whole group. People who use consensus have the greatest chance of attaining that goal when they possess a harmonious understanding and acceptance of each other and each person's potential wisdom. Ego, and uneasiness about personalities or about power or disempowerment, can tax the process.
• We asked the questions, "How can these dilemmas be resolved? And how can the FIC help?" One answer was, "Compassion. Perseverance. Consciousness."

We would enjoy hearing your own insights and observations on this topic.

Communities magazine is published by the nonprofit Fellowship for Intentional Community (FIC).